There is a massive decline in smokers worldwide, but Israel is seeing the opposite, according to a new World Health Organization study released on Tuesday.
There are 1.25 billion adult tobacco users in the world, according to the latest estimates in the World Health Organization (WHO) Tobacco Trends Report. Today, one in five adults consumes tobacco compared to one in three in 2000.
But the smoking rate in Israel – where smoking and vaping by teens and children is uncounted – is apparently bucking that trend due to trauma and despair after the barbarous October 7 Hamas incursion and the War in Gaza. Over 8,000 Israelis die from smoking, including some 2,000 from secondhand smoke, each year. This figure is much greater than victims of road accidents and terror, including on October 7 and the resulting war.
New studies have been delayed
The Health Ministry has not conducted a new study for several years since it claimed 20% of Israelis 21 years and over smoked. Their old data do not include secondhand smoking effects suffered by non-smokers on their balconies, in stairwells and inside their apartments against which the ministry has taken no action, said Amos Hausner, the longtime chairman of the Israel Council for the Prevention of Smoking.
Public health experts report that numerous non-smoking reserve soldiers have taken up the deadly habit, and large numbers of bored and traumatized youngsters who have been forced to evacuate with their families their homes from the north and south have started to smoke and drink alcohol.
Hausner said that public health experts have just marked the 60th anniversary of the first Surgeon General’s Health Report on Smoking released in 1964. It was a landmark first step to diminish the impact of tobacco use on the health of the American people and urged that one of the most important actions people can take to improve their health is to quit smoking, regardless of their age or how long they have been smoking.
Written by the highest government physician in the US – Dr. Luther L. Terry – it was the first US government report to conclude that smoking was a cause of lung cancer and chronic bronchitis and a probable cause of coronary heart disease. The report estimated that average smokers had a nine- to 10-fold risk of developing lung cancer compared to non-smokers; heavy smokers had at least a 20-fold risk. The risk rose with the duration of smoking and diminished with the cessation of smoking.
The government has spoken about raising tobacco taxes – not for health reasons but to increase income as the state has a severe deficit due to the war, but tobacco lobbying could put an end to this, Hausner suggested.
The new WHO report showed that 150 countries are successfully reducing tobacco use. Brazil has made a relative reduction of 35% since 2010, and the Netherlands is on the verge of reaching the 30% target.
“Good progress has been made in tobacco control in recent years, but there is no time for complacency. I’m astounded at the depths the tobacco industry will go to pursue profits at the expense of countless lives. We see that the minute a government thinks they have won the fight against tobacco, the tobacco industry seizes the opportunity to manipulate health policies and sell their deadly products,” said Dr. Ruediger Krech, director of WHO’s health promotion department.
Promising results
Currently, the WHO South-East Asian Region has the highest percentage of the population using tobacco at 26.5%, with the European Region not far behind at 25.3%. The report shows that by 2030, the WHO European Region is projected to have the highest rates globally, with a prevalence of just over 23%. Tobacco use rates among women in the WHO’s European region are more than double the global average and are declining much more slowly than in all other regions.
The prevalence of tobacco use has changed little since 2010 in some countries, while six countries – apparently including Israel – are still seeing tobacco use rising: Congo, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Oman, and the Republic of Moldova. The UN body urged countries to speed up efforts for tobacco control as there is “still much work to be done to protect health policy from increased tobacco industry interference has deteriorated around the world.”
To protect future generations and ensure that tobacco use continues to decline, the WHO will dedicate this year’s World No Tobacco Day to protecting children from tobacco industry interference.